Sheboygan Legion advances to championship at tournament

For the first two games of the Steve Seymour Memorial Tournament, the Sheboygan Legion team went largely untested.

Sure, Green Bay Southwest kept things interesting, but when the later innings came, Sheboygan took control and did what it needed to do to walk away with the victory.

That changed on Saturday. Sheboygan hosted Menasha in their third game of the tournament and it took every ounce of heroism the team had to pull out the 6-5 win.

Sheboygan entered the top of the seventh inning ahead by a run, but relief pitcher Tyler Zietz, on for starter Conner Harrison, surrendered the tying run on a fielder's choice with one out. Zietz managed to preserve the tie and in the bottom half of the frame, Alex Feudner took matters into his own hands.

"He threw me a curveball first, which I took for a ball, and then he threw another ball, so I knew he had to put one over the plate," he said. "I decided that if he put one close, I was going to try to smack it as hard as I could. That's what happened."

With one out, Feudner blasted a towering home run to left field to earn Sheboygan the walk-off win. The home run not only sent Sheboygan past Menasha, but made them a lock for Sunday's championship game.

"I'm pretty happy because we're 3-0 and in great position to win the championship," he said. "That's the goal whenever you're in a tournament like this. I'm pretty happy right now."

Coach Steve Goes said the walk-off was a testament to the brand of ball his guys are playing right now. They're clicking on all cylinders and the tournament championship is well within their sights.

"We have a lot of confidence and we have a lot of things going our way," he said. "We had the one bad inning where things got away from us. We got away from our fundamentals a little bit. We kept chipping away though and we didn't quit once they put up that big inning. That could have been a heck of a lot worse."

After such a dramatic win, Goes said his team is chock-full of confidence and ready for Sunday's championship game.

"We're in the championship, and a walk-off like that doesn't hurt," he said. "The next game starts 0-0, but to go into a ballgame with a win like that, especially after being down because we coughed one up in the seventh, is huge."